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| The Sibley Muse | |||
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Newsletter of the Sibley Music Library THE SIBLEY MUSE is published three times a year by the Sibley Music Library, Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester, 27 Gibbs Street, Rochester, NY 14604. Jim Farrington, Editor. ISSN: 0161-1690 INSIDE THIS ISSUE: Sibley Website Gets a Facelift Sibley Library is extremely happy to announce that its website has been completely redesigned. The plans for the makeover began when the Eastman site was done. The new site should be much easier to navigate, and has significantly improved graphics (no more beige-on-black!). Sibley staff went through drafts of possible site maps and navigation issues, the final versions of which were given to Amy Vetter and Noah Lapidus in the Office of Communications, who brought these ideas to life. These changes also precipitated a change of website address, which is now http://www.rochester.edu/sibley. The links from the main Eastman site are correct, but bookmarks on your own computer may need updating. Some of the key features you will find include:
The new site is still something of a work in progress. There are still a few pages for which text is being written, and some parts of the website, most notably Special Collections, will be updated in the future. Comments or questions should be directed to the Sibley webmaster, Jim Farrington. As we begin the new academic year it is a particular pleasure to welcome new students and faculty to Eastman, and to the Sibley Music Library. Returning students and faculty may notice a small but significant change in the third-floor stack area. In order to provide increased shelf capacity for newly acquired recordings-particularly CDs-we expanded the recordings shelving into the third-floor stacks area. By moving a significant portion of our LP collection into this new area, we opened up shelving closer to the Reserve and Recordings Desk for recently acquired CDs. The books collection on third floor was then redistributed to accommodate future growth of that collection. Less visible summer projects are no less important. Curtis Wilcox of Eastman's Technology & Music Production staff and Gerry Szymanski of the Sibley staff worked together to lay the groundwork for streamed audio. Starting with the MM/PRL listening exam and expanding into reserve listening assignments for fall semester, streamed audio is a means to provide easy access to heavily-used library materials. It is the audio equivalent to our electronic reserve service for required course-related readings. Also during the course of the summer Amy Vetter and Noah Lapidus of Eastman's Communications staff worked with Jim Farrington and other Sibley staff members to accomplish a complete revision of the Sibley website. We expect the new site (www.rochester.edu/Sibley) to become public at about the same time this newsletter appears. Finally in this list of summer accomplishments, during August we welcomed two new staff members to the Ruth T. Watanabe Special Collections Department; you can read more about Claire Michelle Viola and Katherine Axtell elsewhere in this issue of The Sibley Muse. It has been a busy but productive summer in Sibley Music Library; now we join you in the challenges and rewards of another academic year at Eastman. Jennifer Bowen was recently elected Vice Chair/Chair Elect of the American Library Association/Association for Library Collections and Technical Services' Cataloging and Classification Section, and is just completing her second term as a representative to the Program for Cooperative Cataloging's Policy Committee. On September 6th, Jennifer will chair a meeting at the British Library in London in her capacity as chair of an international working group of librarians from the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and Australia. This working group, appointed by the committee that oversees the standard library catalog rules used in the English-speaking world (the Joint Steering Committee for the Revision of the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules), is currently studying the collocation of search results in online library systems. At this meeting the working group members from the U.K. and the U.S. will begin to develop criteria for the evaluation of this aspect of online library systems. Dan Zager attended the 2002 meeting of the International Association of Music Libraries, held in August at the University of California, Berkeley. He was invited to read a paper about the Sibley Music Library in a session that also included the librarians of Juilliard, Oberlin, and Cal Arts. Dan's paper focused on the history of the Sibley Music Library, particularly the history of antiquarian buying in Europe during the late 1920s and early 1930s. The second part of the paper, using as a case study Dan's teaching in the Sacred Music Diploma program, illustrated the advantage of using primary source materials from the seventeenth century in teaching historical issues of performance in church music. Brenda Robak, Acquisitions and Serials Assistant, has been offered a one-year position with the Louisiana Philharmonic in New Orleans. Her last day at Sibley will be September 13th. This is a great opportunity for Brenda, and we wish her the best as she pursues her performance career. Claire Michelle Viola has recently been appointed Sound Recording Archivist following the departure of Esther Gillie to a position at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Claire Michelle graduated in 1991 from Cornell University, where she majored in applied music (flute). As an undergraduate she played first flute in the Cornell University Wind Ensemble under conductor Dr. Mark Scatterday '89, who was recently appointed conductor of the Eastman Wind Ensemble. She completed her masters degree in music education in 1993 at SUNY-Fredonia, and taught school music for two years. Claire Michelle came to the Sibley Music Library in 1996 to work in the Technical Services department, and in 2000 finished her MLS at Buffalo. An active flutist, she participates in the Rochester Flute Association. Katherine Axtell has recently been appointed Special Collections Assistant, working half-time. Katherine graduated in 2000 from Whitman College (Walla Walla), where she received the B.A. degree in music history and piano performance. In the summer of 2000 Katherine was awarded a Fulbright scholarship for a year's study in Sweden, but elected instead to enroll in the ESM postgraduate program in musicology. That fall she began working as a student hourly in the Special Collections department, where she has showed utmost diligence in working with archival materials. While Katherine's research interests are wide-ranging, her current area of active pursuit is centered in the 19th century. She is at work preparing critical editions of both the Piano Trio and the Piano Quartet by Swedish composer Elfrida Andrée (1841-1929), soon to be published by A-R Editions as part of the series Recent Researches in the Music of the 19th and 20th Centuries. This past summer she enjoyed a research stint in Sweden, visiting both Stockholm and Götebörg. Review by Robert Iannapollo, Head of Circulation On August the 9th, Eastman School of Music was abuzz with anticipation for (what may be) the first annual Sibley Library Musicale. The concert arose from an idea to festively celebrate the departure of recordings archivist Esther Gillie who had accepted a new position at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Each Sibley Library employee with a musical bent was given a chance to perform in the cozy environment of the Howard Hanson Hall. The duo of trumpeter Jim Farrington (Head of Public Services) accompanied by his wife, Annette, on piano began the concert. They performed two selections by trumpeter and Eastman alum, Allen Vizzutti: Rainforest and The Sea. Although the pieces were programmatic, neither stooped to the obvious. Not considered particularly virtuosic, there were still some tricky passages over which Jim maneuvered with aplomb. Annette's accompaniment was sensitively done, never overpowering the lead voice. This was a good opportunity to hear two rarely performed pieces that deserve a wider audience. Circulation Services Librarian Gerry Szymanski composed and played piano on The Open Doorway for viola and piano. John Pickford Richards, a student worker in the library and member of the Susie Kelly String Quartet, performed the viola part. A deceptively modern work, there was a certain whimsy and a sense of mystery to it that made it an attractive piece of music. Another rarely performed piece that deserves a wider audience, it was effectively rendered by the performers. Next came a pair of "Fiddle Tunes" performed by cataloger (and musicology major) Rebecca McCallum. She performed two pieces that demonstrated the differences between various styles of folk playing. The first piece was a Quebecois stomp that mixed rough phrasing on the violin with foot stomping in a music designed for dancing. The Appalachian piece demonstrated a more legato approach and a more wistful sense of melody. As a member of the group The Groovemongers, she performs this type of music at world music festivals and clubs. It was nice to hear her perform this music solo with the sound of her hands and feet resonating throughout Hanson Hall. This was followed by cataloger Linda Blair and newly-appointed archivist of the Eastman Audio Archives Claire Michelle Viola performing Sonata For Two Flutes by 18th century French composer Jean-Jacques Naudot. A courtly piece, it was a sharp contrast to the piece that went before it. It was delivered with a stately elegance. Finally, Special Collections Librarian David Peter Coppen played the first movement of Ned Rorem's Piano Sonata No. 2. Although best known for his song cycles, Rorem has also composed a large number of instrumental works that are lesser known. Composed in 1950, this sonata displays the influence of his period of study in France. Although an earlier work, it still contained many of the elements that were to emerge in his more famous songs. Harmonically dense and with a lot of movement, David captured a lightness and charm inherent in the music and he brought out a sense of melody in the piece's more complex passages. Regrettably, a final piece, an aria from Saint-Saens' opera Samson et Dalila to be sung by Esther Gillie (accompanied by David) was not performed due to extenuating circumstances. Attendees of the subsequent reception, however, were treated to a demonstration of her ventriloquism skills assisted by G. Dale Vargason. A good time was had by all.
Sibley Staff who performed in the Sibley Musicale (L to R): John Pickford Richards, Gerry Szymanski, Annette Farrington, Jim Farrington, David Peter Coppen, Linda Blair, Claire Michelle Viola, Rebecca McCallum The multi-level exhibit, Celebrating Marian, will be on display through Alumni Weekend. After that, two new exhibits will be mounted. G. Dale Vargason will use the second floor display case for Letters to Ruth. Ruth T. Watanabe, Librarian emeritus at Sibley, wrote the program notes for many of Howard Hanson's American Music Festival concerts during the 1940s, '50s and '60s. Ruth corresponded with many well-known American composers whose works were being performed at the Festivals. David Peter Coppen will launch a cycle of exhibits commemorating the careers of former ESM faculty members. The first will honor José Echániz (1905-69), professor of piano from 1944 until 1969. A native of Cuba, Mr. Echániz made a successful Town Hall debut in New York in 1922, and thereafter remained an active recitalist throughout the U.S. and Europe, and later was a successful conductor. Summer Changes to Sibley Stacks When browsing the stacks on the third floor, you might notice that things aren't quite where they used to be. There has been a major shift in the ML books as we have expanded the Recordings Stacks beyond the back of the listening room. This grand project accommodates the many new CDs and video recordings the library has been acquiring over the past few years, and to make sure there is lots of space for expansion. For many of you, the sight through the new gate of an entire aisle filled with LP records, videos, and media items will be an eye-opener, showing just a small portion of what Sibley actually has "behind closed doors" in its sound recording collection. We'll have shifted almost 50,000 sound recordings by the time we're through. This move necessitated shifting virtually all of the ML section of the third floor, which also served to relieve some of the overcrowding that some areas were experiencing. The Reference Stacks have also been shifted. The general, English encyclopedias (some of which were over 30 years old) are gone, and the general, non-English encyclopedias have been transferred to the third floor. This has allowed us to move the M- and ML1-54-classed reference books to the outside row near Quick Reference, and lessen the overcrowding in the ML100-102 section. Perhaps the best bit of news from the stacks is that the entire M section has been shelf-read. Over the course of the summer, student worker Heather Gardner took on the task of straightening and putting in correct call number order every score on the second floor. The M section is in probably its best shape since the building opened in 1989.
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